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In the past, when creating AD domains, I've used the common convention of using a sub-domain of the company's publicly registered domain name, e.g "corp.mycompany.com" or "int.mycompany.com". I've always accepted the default NetBIOS name when running DCPromo, for fear that creating a NetBIOS name that differs from the sub-domain may cause complications.

I've recently been doing a bit of research on the consequences of providing an alternate NetBIOS name. The main reasons behind this are:

  • The NetBIOS name isn't particularly descriptive or unique to the company
  • Apparently generic NetBIOS names such as "CORP" or "INT" can cause issues when merging IT systems (although I've not had experience with this myself)
  • Providing something "before the slash" that means more to users (less important)

In looking at the possible downsides, the only one I can come up with is the disjointed namespace issue when configuring Exchange.

Can anybody with more experience than I elaborate on my findings at all?

Many thanks

dbr
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1 Answers1

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We have had that in place for 8+ years, with 13 domains and no adverse effects.

Where they are different, our Pre-Windows 2000 domain names are CNAMES (aliases) for the substitute names.

Greg Askew
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